STATEN ISLAND, N.Y. – The Staten Island Chamber of Commerce and the Advance hosted held their Police Officer of the Year luncheon at the Old Bermuda Inn in Rossville last week.
In addition to the brave police officers and detectives who were honored, District Attorney Michael McMahon also got some kudos, from Mayor Eric Adams and NYPD Chief of Department Kenneth Corey.
Speaking to the crowd, Adams decried how too often laws have been passed favoring criminals over crime victims, and how too many prosecutors and judges weren’t doing their jobs.
“I wish I had a D.A. McMahon all over this country,” Adams said.
Corey, a Staten Island resident and former NYPD borough commander, called McMahon “the best district attorney, certainly in the State of New York.”
“You get so comfortable with a certain working relationship, and I’m proud to call him a friend,” Corey said. “And, again, we didn’t always agree. But reasonable people can sometimes agree to disagree.”
McMahon appreciated the kind words.
“I do my best to keep the people safe,” the D.A. told us after the event. “And that means having a common-sense approach to law enforcement. Which means if somebody commits a serious crime, we’re going to hold them accountable.”
McMahon said that low-level offenders who need drug or mental-health treatment are frequently offered alternatives to incarceration.
“We, together with the Police Department, hold people accountable,” he said. “We have to hold each other accountable, and ourselves accountable.”
McMahon said that even with rising crime a top concern in the city, Staten Island remains the safest community of its size in the country
Still, McMahon said, “We’ve got a lot of work to do, because there are too many guns, there’s too much crime, and there’s a sense that people are not safe out there.”
Said McMahon, “The bottom line is, if we do our job with common sense, follow the law and the facts, we’ll be OK.”
ADAMS THE PATRIOT
Adams, a former NYPD captain, told the crowd that he wakes up every day and reads the Pledge of Allegiance. He then recited the pledge from the podium.
“When we took that out of schools,” Adams said, “we took away planting the seed of patriotism in our children. We’re taking our country for granted. And I’m not going to do that.”
Strong words – and from a big-city Dem, no less – given the protests we’ve seen against the flag and the National Anthem in recent years.
Adams, the second Black elected mayor in city history, said that “everyone has abandoned the law enforcement community in this country and the people that we protect.”
Said Adams, “Tell me the last law that was passed for innocent people. Tell me the last law that was passed to be there for a person who was the victim of a crime. Every law we pass is focusing on people who commit crimes.”
Adams said he wants every borough Chamber of Commerce to follow Staten Island’s lead and hold Police Officer of the Year events.
“Don’t silently say you support the police,” Adams said. “We need to have billboards, full-page ads, radio PSAs. We’ve got to take back the narrative.”
COREY ONE OF US
Chief Corey may be a Staten Island resident and a former Island borough NYPD commander, but, as he himself pointed out, he’s not a native Staten Islander.
And Corey knows that that matter to those folks who believe that being a lifelong Staten Islander is the top of the pecking order out here, with native Islanders and longtime Islanders ranking lower.
The Advance of course contributed to that dynamic by making those distinctions when writing obituaries.
Some flinty Islanders will even question your “lifelong” or “native” bona fides if you were born in a hospital in another borough or in New Jersey while your family was living here.
Speaking to the crowd at the Old Bermuda Inn and thanking the police officers here who keep borough residents, including his own family, safe, Corey jokingly called himself “a longtime resident of Staten Island, never to be referred to as a, you know, Staten Islander. That’s OK.”
We don’t like to differ with a top-ranking member of the NYPD, but we think that there are plenty of folks out here who consider Corey, who’s lived here for 25 years, one of us and who take pride in his accomplishments.
FLYING IN ON TWO WHEELS
The keynote speaker at the luncheon was NYPD Commissioner Keechant Sewell, who, like Adams, was slightly delayed getting to the event because of police business.
“I kind of flew in here on two wheels,” Sewell told the crowd. “I’m surprised I didn’t get a ticket, actually.”
Frank Scarangello, Chamber chairman of the board, had mentioned Sewell’s TikTok account when introducing her, but the commissioner said, “I don’t think I’ve ever seen my TikTok account.”
She said, “I am absolutely inept at social media. So when people tell me ‘I follow you on social media,’ I have to be honest with you, you follow a detective named Scott Glick. I rely on him tremendously.”
JUST DESSERTS FOR COPS
We just had to share a photo of the dessert that was served at the luncheon: A crème brulee-like dish with fruit, adorned with a silver police badge.
And, yes, the badge was edible. We were told it was a chocolate cookie.
We heard it was delicious.
Eye-catching dessert with chocolate cookie police badge, served at Police Officer of the Year luncheon at the Old Bermuda Inn, Rossville. (Tom Wrobleski/Staten Island Advance)
